The Marketing Plan Outline - Economic Development and ...

convenience. Also, don't forget to consider your competitor's packaging. How can you make yours
better?
Warranties
The same goes for warranties. Particularly if yours is a new product, make sure you give buyers some
level of comfort that if the product doesn't do what they thought, they can easily get their money back.
The key here is easily. Make sure they know just how easy it will be if they are unhappy with the
product. Think about Land's End clothing company's policy: You can wash and wear, wash and wear,
wash and wear, and then decide you don't like the shirt or something about it isn't quite right and send it
back for a quick and complete refund. The return authorization slip is right there in the box. It doesn't get
much easier than that.
So in this section of your marketing plan, describe the strategic use of your product's packaging,
warranties, and whatever else you come up with. Explain the benefit you expect to see from it and how
it relates to the overall success of the marketing program.
Price Strategy
The next P is price. How do you know how to price your product or service? Your product's price often
communicates as much to the consumer as its advertising. People perceive a product's value based on
its price in many situations -- it depends on what your product is and who your market is.
Here is an example: An established restaurant that had just started getting fresh seafood daily from the
coast (which was about a four-hour drive away) and was charging eight dollars for a typical seafood
dinner entree. They couldn't sell it at all. Rather than lower the price or drop it from their menu, they
decided to raise the price to $12.95. The fish sold like crazy. The moral of the story is that people are
leery of cheap seafood.
The moral for you is: Be wary of super low pricing. Your customers are looking for value, not the
cheapest product they can find. Price your product strategically by looking at:
• The competition (or lack of it) your product faces - If your product is one of a kind, particularly if
it's in the technology field, then higher initial prices may be more palatable to consumers (and
even expected).
• The sensitivity (or insensitivity) of your customers to pricing for your type of product (as in the
case of airlines)
• The price elasticity (the lower the price the more you sell and vice versa) - Keep in mind what
you have to sell in order to make a profit, and then chart out the variations in prices and
quantities to sell in order to pinpoint the right one.
• The value of the product as it relates to the value of the price - People may pay more for a
similar product if they think they will get more out of it.
• The positioning you've established for your product
Write the pricing strategy section of your marketing plan and back up your pricing decisions with current
data about competitors' prices, price surveys, etc.
Place Strategy
The third P stands for place, although it's really referring to distribution. I guess you can think of it as the
"place" of purchase. The strategy behind how you sell and distribute your product is a very important
element of your marketing mix. Do you want your product to be available everywhere? If you do the
math, that could be a very lucrative strategy. Or, do you want to create demand for it because it's
exclusive and hard to find, requiring the right connections or even traveling to large cities? (The latter